I’ll take you through how I photographed this major indoor car show.

Like last year’s event, I planned a full day to cover the entire convention center. I arrived early and left late in the day. Here’s how it all went down.

Camera Equipment

First, let’s start with the photo equipment I used for the car show:

• Nikon D7100
• Nikon 18-70mm f/3.5 (only kit lens I still own and use often)
• Nikon 80-200mm f/2.8
• Tamrac MX5347 M.A.S. Pro 200 Lens Case
• Nikon SB910 speedlight
• 2 – SanDisk Extreme 32 GB SDHC Class 10 UHS-1 Flash Memory Card 45MB/s

The only thing I regretted taking was the 80-200mm f/28 lens, I only used it once for a few photos, then it went back into its lens case which I had strapped to my side belt. Next time it’s staying home.

I know some of you would say that I needed a full frame camera, perhaps, but this is what I used, not necessarily what some would consider the best. However, like real photographers often say, it’s the person behind the camera that truly matters!

Ideal Camera Settings

This time I decided to preset my camera using the U1 and U2 on my D7100.

• U1 was set to aperture priority, vivid, with an base ISO sensitivity of 100 and max of 2000 and a minimum shutter speed of 1/100. ISO sensitivity control set to on.
• U2 was set to aperture priority, vivid, ISO of 400 (but I would often override that to much higher, up to 2000).  I preset the Depth of Field preview button to instead switch to take raw image pictures. ( I had .jpg as default). This way only the most important photos were taken in raw format.

Plus, on both settings I had my SB910 flash attached to the camera. But I had set the camera’s flash sync speed set to 1/320 FP.

LA Auto Show 2013 photo results

Now to some of the photos.

The photo above was taken with the following camera settings: f/3.5, 1/200 sec, at 22mm focal length and an ISO of 200. Nikon SB910 flash was used.

I’ll share a few images taken with a flash below then at the end some using only the existing light at the convention center.

Down below the main halls, at Kentia Hall, you’ll find the beautiful statuesque model Autumn Adele (check out her photos on Instagram) at the Specialty Car Craft venue.

More from Kentia Hall below, Crystal Martinez greeted guests to the Galpin Auto Sports exhibit.

Below promotional models Arley Elizabeth (Instagram) and Brittani Paige (Instagram) for Al & Ed’s Autosound posed for our viewing pleasure, oh yes and also to show how sometimes using your Nikon SB910 will cast a shadow unless you either bounce it our diffuse it. In this case I did neither, so although the ladies are still beautiful, lighting them was not my best work.

Below, this area in Kentia Hall had very low light, so it was a little challenging to get the right exposure.

Below, Laura Baker and Susan representing K1-Speed.

Back up in main showroom floor, these two promotional models posed next to the all new 2014 Corvette Stingray. In the main area, the lighting is very spotty as the venue is setup to showcase the cars not necessarily people.

On a side note, some of the featured cars like the one below by Chrysler and the first photo I posted earlier by Fiat are using some similar pastel (baby blueish) colors.

Ok, so now that you’ve seen a few images taken with a flash, let me show you what you can do with the flash diffuser that comes with the SB910. It’s the small plastic square piece that attaches to the end of the flash. I sometimes use it directly on the subject or angle it in a certain way that allows me to control the direction.

The SRT below was taken with this diffuser.

Here’s another example, but as you can see the existing spot lights can cause some over exposed areas.

So as you can see, the final results varied but it mainly had to do with the constant changing exposure of the spotlights and spinning cars. In the end there are only two options for photographing cars and people in low light situations like the Los Angeles Auto Show:

1. Shoot at a high ISO (above 1600) and fill the frame so that you won’t need to do any cropping/enlargements.
2. Shoot with an external flash like the SB910 or equivalent for your camera system.

Overall it was a fun day and I’m looking forward to next year!

Each year I spend several days covering the event, which includes lots of pro surfing and large crowds of people wearing tiny little bikini’s, well at least the girls do.

There was a new sponsor this year, Vans stepped up after Nike didn’t renew it after last year’s event. Which it seems they lost out because this year’s attendance was much more than any previous year.

The crowds were huge! You’ll get to see that in some of the photos below.

If you’ve never seen some of my photos from the previous years, or if you don’t live near a beach, then some of the images might be a little too much to handle. If so, then I’m giving you fair warning.

The US Open of Surfing starts on a Saturday and runs for nine days. The organizers literally build a small city on the sand. Including a large full size Vans store, a full custom build cement skate/bmx bowl with bleachers, concert stage and large stadium bleachers facing the beach with VIP and Media tents.

Yes, this is a big event. In fact it’s the largest (in attendance) surfing competition/festival in the world.

First lets start the real important stuff, photos of the surf competition. Most local surf photographers look forward each year to this time of the summer. The worlds best surfers come out and compete in what normally includes average 4-7ft waves.

Early in the week there was a nice swell that produced decent waves. Crowd favorites like Kelly Slater, Alana Blanchard, Alejo Muniz, Carissa Moore among many others were in attendance. As well as the JR Pro Surfers like Tatiana Weston-Webb and Bianca-Buitendag.

Here’s a few images of the surfers.

Behind the Surfing Stadium, the US Open of Surfing Festival Village was always full of people. Literally thousands of people are walking around in the temporary city built on the sand. With a custom build cement bmx and skate bowl to a large music stage to a full size Vans shoe/apparel store. This area is huge.

Many of the sponsors had booths with lots of giveaways and fun stuff for the visitors. I mean where else can you take a dip in the ocean then walk over in your bikini and ride a mechanical bull?

Or get a chance to win some cool prizes at the Casio Commando 4G LTE booth when in reality all you wanted to do is check out the hot sexy promo models?

This Cracker Jack’D promo model was a hit at the event. Not only was she handing out free snacks, the cute smile and sexy bikini were an extra bonus!

The Tilly’s promo models where all over Main St., here’s a group shoot with another promo team in green.

The event is so popular that there’s a good chance you’ll run into a few well known models. Here’s Arianny Celeste and a few friends enjoying the competition during the week.

Or below, Francesca Aiello of Frankies Bikinis taking a few photos for her Instagram account.

Under the pier seems to be the place many go to take photos. I captured a crew from bikini.com doing an impromptu photo shoot with a model wearing a top that read #beachesbelike

But one of the craziest things you’ll see at the US Open of Surfing are all the writings on people’s bodies. From “free hugs”, “free kisses” to “tap this” or “slap this” with an arrow pointed down to their butts.

Yes, it’s crazy and for most people it’s a little too extreme. But each year it gets bigger and bigger. The organizers love it, but the locals hate it. Imagine the crowds? Not for one day but for an entire week!

Here’s a little of what I’m talking about. Note that I didn’t show the more extreme stuff that goes on in the festival area.

Finally, here’s a few more to illustrate the large crowds and people of the US Open of Surfing.

Don’t miss my US Open of Surfing photos from previous years here: 2012 and 2011.

Photo taken with a Nikon DSLR

For most people, taking photos with their smart phone is a fun experience. Sharing them on social sites is the norm, but for a select few it’s just the beginning to a whole new world of artistic expression.

No, I’m not talking about “selfie” pics in front of a mirror, but in many ways that’s where it all starts. The smart phone has not replaced the traditional DSLR camera, but it has introduced many new people to photography.

So how do you know when its time to “trade” up from your smart phone camera to a DSLR?

In the last month I know of two people who either have or will be buying a new DSLR. For each, this was or will be their first “real” camera. In both cases it’s interesting to see how they reached this point:

• Both are constantly taking photos with their cell phones.
• Each seem to carefully frame their shots.
• Their photos often tell a story or are used to tell a story.
• The photos they share are constantly improving.
• They enjoy the process of taking the photo just as much as sharing them.
• Both start to understand the limitations of the camera they are currently using.

One of these friends purchased the Nikon D5200 and has never looked back. It has opened up a whole new way of taking photos that was not possible with his cell phone.

Often new DSLR owners realize that a photo can look very different depending on the camera settings. Unlike a smart phone, which relies heavily on special filters to enhance the image.

For example, in the image above I used an aperture of F/5 and a 80-200mm 2.8 lens. I filled the frame and so it resulted in the background being out of focus and the model in focus. To do this with a cell phone is almost impossible. The photo would have been flat.

Knowing that these differences are a result of the photographer knowing how to use his/her equipment is a good indication that one is ready to trade up.

But more importantly having the passion (and patience) to learn the craft is the real test. You can take all the photography classes in the world, learn about the “Rule of Thirds” and all the other principles taught by instructors. But if it’s not in you, that new DSLR will eventually just be another bookend on your desk.

So save yourself some money and know when and if it’s time to trade up to a DSLR.

Don’t forget to follow me on: Facebook | Twitter | Youtube | Google+ | Instagram

No front or back focus problems here!

Many Nikon D7000 users have recently been complaining about back focus problems. If you’re one of them, not to worry, there is a fix.

It may seem that the “problem” lies on the D7000 cameras, however do a Google search for “back focus problems” and you’ll quickly see that people have been complaining about this since the early 2000′s. In the case of the Nikon D7000, the issue is no different than any other DSLR, the lens is focusing behind the main subject.

The reason some users experience this and others don’t has more to do with lens type and a user’s tolerance level. By tolerance, I mean the ability to see it in the everyday photos they take. If you’re unable to see it during regular use, is it really a problem? Probably not. For others, this may not be the case.

Here is the fix to the back focus issue. Like most modern DSLR’s the Nikon D7000 allows for AF Fine Tuning, giving you the option to adjust the focus point forward or back for all your lenses (up to 12 lenses). Here are the steps.

First, visit Jeffrey Friedl’s blog on using his Autofocus Test Chart. It’s all free and includes a calibration graph to conduct the test. This will tell you if and how much front or back focus adjustment your camera needs for the different lenses you use.

Second, once you conduct the test go to your Setup Menu on your camera and choose the option AF Fine Tune. On your user manual for the D7000 (English edition) it’s on page 246. Its default is set to OFF, change it to ON. Then adjust the focal point toward your camera (-1,-2, etc) to fix the back focus. Or adjust the focal point away from the camera (+1,+2, etc) to fix any front focus.

Finally, press the OK button to save the setting for each lens, and that’s it!

The camera will recall each setting once you attach your lenses. You can also turn this feature on or off without losing the settings.

Hope this helps, especially those with a Nikon D7000 looking for a fix to the back focus issue.

UPDATE: I want to update the readers that there is another option for fixing the back focus on the D7000. Using the LensAlign or SpyderLensCal Lens Calibration Systems can be more accurate. So if the above method does not fix your problem, these two systems may fix your back focus problem. Those however are not free but will cost about $50-$80. Thanks to several readers for these recommendations.

One additional note, don’t confuse soft focus with back focus. That is a seperate issue that requires a different fix.

A good thing, right? Well…maybe.

For the most part, I’ve held out a bit before commenting on the changes, so I’ll be doing it now. But first, let me start by mentioning a little about our Flickr account.

I’ve had a Flickr account since 2008 (actually the original account started in 2006).  We don’t upload many photos, currently there are just over 400 pictures.

However, we’ve managed to get between 1500-15,000 daily views into our “photo stream”. Since 2008 our Flickr account has had over 7.9 million views. How do I know all this? We have a Pro Flickr account, which gives us daily stats.

New Flickr Features

Now to the new Flickr. The changes include larger images in a continuous loading manner. This can be seen in the:

• New Home Page (sample - only viewable if you are logged in)
• New personal photostream Page (sample)
• New single photo page with large black background (sample)

Plus, the one thing Yahoo has been using as a selling tool:

• Free accounts get 1 terabyte of space to upload photos and videos. More on that later.

Yahoo did away with the popular Flickr Pro accounts (existing paid members can continue to get this as long as they renew), but they will no longer be offered to new users.

Pro members paid $25/year for:

• Unlimited storage space
• Ad free experience
• Statistics
• “Pro” badge

Flickr replaced the Pro accounts with two new paid tiers:

1. “Ad Free” – cost $49.99/year to remove ads from showing when you browse the site
2. “Doublr” – cost $499.99/year for 2 terabytes of photo and video space

My Take On The Flickr Changes

I was on Flickr when they did the switch and it was a big shock. My first reaction was “oh no, this looks like a clone site!” My photostream was no longer neatly organized with a few medium sized images on the left and a few sets on the right. Instead it looked like a mesh of Google+, Tumblr, Facebook and Instagram’s desktop websites all combined into one.

When looking at individual photos, the image was larger but set in a black background. Non photographers always assume all photos look better on “black”, this is not always the case.

I was worried, but not panicking. Time would only tell whether I would adjust and whether it would have an impact on my Flickr traffic.

Knowing that Flickr had a large community of active photographers from around the world, I also knew this was not going to sit well with them. And I was right, see the “Ugly” section below.

I took a deep breath and started to see how this would change things for me and Flickr.

The Good

Most people are not aware of this but Flickr’s daily users have been in decline for several years. Sure they have about 89 million registered members, but having members and actual active visitors are a different thing. If you look at the Quantcast numbers for Flickr’s US visitors, you’ll see a decline of about 1/3 of people visiting the site in the last year.

So Yahoo making changes to Flickr is no surprise, even though I liked it’s simplistic way of navigation I knew it needed to change if it was going to survive. So in this case a “change’ was good.

Also, unlike some Pro members, I’m not letting ours expire. Why would I? I’ve been grandfathered in to have true unlimited space and I get to keep my statistics which are very valuable to me. All for the same price as before – $25/year. Even the new “Doublr” account which costs $499/year doesn’t get what I have!

So that’s the Good thing.

The Bad

Because of the new user interface (UI), loading photos in what is called a “justified” way as one scrolls down, the focus now is entirely on the stream of images as a whole.

Imagine going to an art gallery where instead of the walls being white, they are black and all the art pieces are hung edge to edge. Both side to side and top to bottom. Now stand back, what do you think happens? Yup, the collage itself becomes the focus, not the individual images.

This may work for a smartphone or tablet app, but for a desktop it borders on cluttered.

Add that all the titles, descriptions and comments are now hidden on the bottom half of the photo page, now reduces the chances of communication with the contributor and other members of Flickr.

Flickr was built and maintained by the photo community. Pro’s and non pro’s alike. It’s a place to share, critic and connect with other’s who share the passion of taking photos.

The new UI seems to reduce if not eliminates the ease of the community to do what made Flickr so much fun – interact with each other. This is the “Bad”.

The Ugly

I’m sure Yahoo expected some negative views to the changes, after all they were drastic. But I’m sure they didn’t expect what came next.

A Flickr staff member asked everyone for feedback to the changes. As I write this article, there are over 22 thousand negative replies. All this in less than 4 days since the new update took place.

Not only are they reacting negatively to the changes, many are actually closing down their accounts and leaving to other photo sharing sites. One of the options out there is Ipernity.com, a site that has gone out of the way to embrace the influx of ex-flickr members.

At the same time, Yahoo has only responded by saying that they are working on any “glitches” and only in personal emails to people asking if they can revert back to the old setup, Flickr has said they are not going back.

So you know what comes next? In a community that has so many passionate members, some have resorted to verbally attacking staff online and even leaving nasty remarks at Yahoo’s CEO’s Marissa Mayer Flickr page.

I understand passion, but in this case the way Yahoo and some of its members have reacted to each other is “Ugly”.

My Future With Flickr

It’s obvious that Flickr has changed it’s business model. Having a small community of paid members is not in their plans. They want to go after the numbers and sell ads. This is not necessarily bad, just different.

By the new pricing plan, it’s easy to see that they feel every active user is worth about $50 a year in advertising dollars. With an estimated 89 million users…you do the math.

At this time I’m not jumping ship like some others, it’s much too early for that. Plus I still have my Pro account which is way better than the new tiers.  One terabyte is fine and not the issue for me. It’s more about the statistics. For any business, it’s important to know where/how/when your clients/visitors are finding you.

This kind of change is always possible when you host your images with another company. It’s probably one of the reasons I started this site, so I could have full control. It’s really not that difficult, I wrote about it here.

For now, I suspect Flickr will make some minor adjustments (I’ve seen a few already) to address the slow page loads and a few glitches here and there. But for the most part the old Flickr is gone.

It’s a new place now and that’s how I’m looking at it. Change isn’t always good or pretty, but it is inevitable.

First, I want to say that we didn’t set out to take this image, it was a complete coincidence, we were at the right time and place.

A few weeks ago, we were out covering the Long Beach Grand Prix. It was Sunday and we arrived at about 7 am. We were looking for the “lagoon area” where we had special VIP tickets to the Tecate Hospitality Tent. While arriving to this area, my friend noticed the reflection of the building and we both started to take a few photos.

I knew it would look good, but really didn’t know how great I would love this image until I reviewed it at home on my monitor. I took a total of four shots, two horizontal and two vertical. My friend also captured the same images, with different settings but similar results.

All my four shots had the following settings:

• F/4
• 1/2500 sec
• ISO 160
• 18 mm
• Aperture Priority Mode

I list the camera settings not because they played a large role in producing the image, but only for those that like to the know the details. In fact, what played a larger role in getting this shot had to do with timing.

The image was captured at about 7:28 am, this place is next to the marina so we normally get a cool breeze throughout the day. But in the morning, often there is a period for an hour or two as the sun rises when there is no wind. Sound travels easily and there is a distinct “hollowness” to the air. This is the only way I know how to describe this period of the day.

When this happens, the water in lagoons or lakes seem to lay flat. Sort of like water in a glass. That’s what we experienced when we captured the photo above.

It didn’t matter what camera or lens we used (although I did have to fix the horizontal image on PS for lens distortion because I shot it at 18mm). What mattered more was the weather conditions and in order to get a good reflection, the wind and lighting had to be just right.

Remember, your subject in this case is not the sky or building, it’s the water.

Of course it does help to have an interesting subject. In this case the hotel, bridge and zeppelin balloon made for a perfect reflection.

In the end, although we enjoyed taking photos of the fast cars and our friends at the Grand Prix, like Alexia Cortez, Laura Baker and of course the Tecate Light girls, in the end it’s photos like the one above that really stand out.

So if you normally wake up early, then grab your camera and see if you can take a similar photo. Or better yet, plan it out and look for a period of 2-3 days where the weather is calm, clear and be out with your camera before the sun rises. I’m sure you’ll get a good lake or lagoon reflection photo that you’ll be proud to show off!

Long Beach Grand Prix Tecate Light Promotional Models

I attended the 2013 Toyota Long Beach Grand Prix (LBGP) this past weekend, including the Tecate Light tent party.

Sunday proved to be the main event, with live music from El Conjunto Nueva Ola, a visit from Evander Holyfield, Tommy Hearns, and of course the talented Tecate Light models and dancers.

From fast cars to the beautiful promotional models, really how can one go wrong? This is an event photographers dream come true.

Ok I must admit, the real question is whether the spectators (me) are there to see the car races or the sexy girls posing next to them?

I’ll try to explore this question with a series of photos. I’ve separated the photos into four different sections:

• Lifestyle Expo
• Long Beach Grand Prix Outdoors
• Tecate Light Private Tent Party
• Swisher Racing Girls

Note: this is more about my friend and I covering the event (as spectators not as paid photographers) than it is about cameras and technique. I’ll do a follow up on camera equipment and how to take photos at an event like this later.

Tip: To see the images as a slide, click on the first image then use your curser/next button to navigate through the images. Or right click and open in a new tab to see the full high resolution images.

Lifestyle Expo

The Long Beach Grand Prix surrounds the Convention Center where the Lifestyle Expo is held throughout the weekend. Many car related companies have booths with giveaways, photo opportunities and of course yes…models.

Here’s a few photos from the Expo area in the Convention Center.

Long Beach Grand Prix Outdoors

The Grand Prix area is large, from the Rainbow Marina up to Ocean Blvd, the area is closed off unless you have a ticket. So one must expect to do a lot of walking.

Here are a few photos from the various outdoor locations.

Most of the hired photographers (or those who purchased a Super Photo Ticket go around taking pictures from special areas that are normally off limits to the public). I didn’t do that, there are literally too many paid photographers all taking pictures of similar things. At the Grand Prix I prefer to capture the people, after all that’s what makes this event so much fun!

Tecate Light Private Tent Party

Like I mentioned earlier, this year a good photographer friend and I obtained tickets to the private Tecate Light tent party on Sunday. As you can imagine, lots of food, live music and entertainment. But there were also a couple of nice surprises.

First, a very popular Mexican  musical group called Conjunto Nueva Ola entertained the audience with some crazy fun music. Then the host announced that we were going to have two visitors - Evander Holyfield & Tommy Hearns!

So in no particular order, here are the photos.

Private Tecate Concert of El Conjunto Nueva Ola at the Long Beach Grand Prix

Swisher Racing Girls

While we were walking around in the Lifestyle Expo area, we ran into an impromptu photo shoot with the driver and models for Swisher Racing.

Here are a few shots of what we stumbled upon…

Driver and Swisher Girls Posing for Camera

Swisher models posing for us at the Long Beach Grand Prix 2013

Finally, you must be asking yourself, did you even take pictures of any of the cars? Well yes I did. Here it is:

Toyota Long Beach Grand Prix 2013

So in my unofficial scientific test/observation, the Toyota Long Beach Grand Prix is more than just a car racing event, it’s whatever you want to make of it. But one thing is for sure, it’s a lot of fun. Want to see the races? Done. Want to see the Expo? Do that too. But if you want to know why many men love this event, just look over all the photos on this page one more time!

One final note. A special thanks to NachoPix who helped take some of these photos and get us access to the Sunday events. Plus all those who made the Tecate Tent Party so much fun, including the band el Conjunto Nueva Ola and all the Tecate Light models and dancers.

Any questions regarding this article and photos can be addressed to ray at outletphotography.com.

Take a look at this rant by Youtube user envymeimages:

Ten or 15 years ago, when a consumer would purchase a new camera, most of their time was spent taking pictures or learning how to improve their craft. Now? The tide seems to have turned.

Before the age of the internet one of the few sources for new photography gear was a monthly subscription to Popular Photography magazine, today we have instant access to hundreds of online sites marketing the latest photo gear.

Now in some ways we feel a little “cheated” whenever a new camera is introduced with better features. Have the camera companies learned from Apple by making our camera equipment feel old and “obsolete” by a so called better camera’s introduced only a year apart? I think so.

To be honest I too have fallen for this trap. Will things change? Probably not, for many people, camera gear is more than just a tool for taking photos, it’s become an obsession to have the latest and most expensive gear.

Perhaps the man in the rant video has a point. We all need to slow down a bit and appreciate to use our current gear. So make an effort each week to take more pictures and read less about photo gear!

• Canon EOS Rebel T5i (body only) at Adorama - Amazon. (Price: $749)
• Canon EOS Rebel T5i (w/18-135mm EF-S IS STM Lens) at Adorama – Amazon (Price: $1,099)
• Canon EOS Rebel SL1 (body only) at Adorama – Amazon (Price: $649)
• Canon EOS Rebel SL1  (w/18-55mm EF-S IS STM lens) at Adorama - Amazon (Price: $799)

Canon will soon announce two new camera, the EOS T5i and SL1. But from the rumor mill, it looks like the 70D will not see light until sometime in April, this according to CanonRumors.

Most of the pictures online have been small, here are a few larger ones so you can get a better look.

Canon EOS Rebel T5i large photos

Click on images to enlarge.

The T5i is rumored to be an 18mp camera with DIGIC5, 9pt AF and a vari-angle touchcreen 3″ LCD with 1.04M. Also it will have 5 fps with full HD video. But as we all know, we really won’t be sure until its officially announced.

Next is the Canon Rebel SL1.

Canon EOS Rebel SL1 large photos

The SL1 will have a new 18MP sensor inside, the same at the 70D, according to CanonRumors. I must admit, There isn’t much info out on it, so I guess we’ll have to wait. Expect it to be announced very soon after this article is published.

As always, click on the images to see them a little larger. Or just wait for the official announcement a little later.

I knew it was popular a few years back, but I must admit I didn’t know it was still that popular until earlier today when the price of the D90 body dropped in price. The new lower price is $599, considering that all other stores are listing it for over $750, I’d say this is a great deal.

I’m assuming this deal won’t last long as I’m sure they’re trying to offload their remaining supply of D90′s.

As for the rating on Flickr, over 101 million photos have been taken with the D90 and uploaded to that site.

The top 5 Nikon camera’s on Flickr as of this posting is:

1. D7000
2. D90
3. D3100
4. D5100
5. D700

Here’s a screenshot of the rating page.

So, the D90 was popular then and continues to be today. This lower $599 price, makes it the perfect alternative for anyone looking for a second body or just getting into photography. The D90 would be a great second body for anyone getting the new D7100 too. Whatever the circumstance, it’s a great price for a reliable DX camera.